CHAPTER 8
Harrison awoke with a start and wondered where
the hell he was in the moment before true wakefulness occurred.
Then he saw that he was in his sleeping bag. On the floor of his
new apartment. And it was damn cold. Jesus. June could be winter on
the Oregon coast. Worse than Portland.
Staggering to his feet, he stumbled
into the shower, letting the hot spray rain over his head. He
didn’t know how long he stood there. Long enough to make water
conservationists shudder the world over, he supposed.
From the shower he threw on some gray
sweatpants and a black long-sleeved T-shirt, then padded barefoot
to the kitchen, where he stumbled rotely through the steps of
making coffee. He was so lost in thought, he was almost surprised
when the coffeemaker beeped at him that it was finished
brewing.
After pouring himself a cup, he opened
the refrigerator, hoping for cream or milk, knowing there was
neither. He drank the coffee black and in between gulps took
several deep breaths. After ten minutes he felt almost human, and
he switched on his television with its DVR—his one indulgence that
was critical to his job—and played back Channel Seven’s eleven
o’clock news. He had glanced at it when he’d returned the night
before, spent a little time on the Internet, researching the escape
of Justice Turnbull, then, exhaustion catching up with him, had
slid into the sleeping bag. Now he watched the segment that dealt
with Justice Turnbull’s escape in more detail, taking mental
notes.
First there was a bit with Pauline
earlier in the evening, in front of the redwood and brick facade of
Halo Valley Security Hospital. Patrol cars were parked every which
way, some with their lights flashing. Pauline was explaining about
the two sides of the hospital, Side B being the section that housed
the criminally insane. In voice overlay she explained where Justice
Turnbull had escaped, and the camera caught the portico outside of
Side B, which was on the back side of the building, the eastern
side, and mirrored Side A, which faced west. More sheriff’s
department vehicles stood in attendance. It looked like they’d sent
the whole damn force, and maybe they had.
Questions were asked of law enforcement
and the Halo Valley staff. The camera zoomed in on Detective
Langdon Stone with the Tillamook County Sheriff’s Department.
Harrison gave him a hard look as he seemed to be the officer in
charge. If he was going to dig into this story, he would
undoubtedly butt heads with Stone at some future point, and it was
unlikely to be an easy friendship.
Stone wore a black leather jacket,
jeans, and cowboy boots, and his brown hair was tossed by an errant
breeze. He said, “No comment,” enough times to make it sound like a
rap song. Pauline clearly knew him, or thought she did, and her
usual brisk, probing tone held a kittenish note of wheedling.
Clearly Stone found her excruciating, and when one of the doctors
from the hospital, Dr. Claire Norris, stepped into the fray,
Harrison didn’t miss the way Stone gazed at her with an
unflinching, yet somehow self-conscious, stare. Something going on between them, he
deduced.
Dr. Norris couldn’t shed much light on
Turnbull’s escape; she was on Side A, not B. Pauline abruptly
switched from them to Side B’s portico, where she interviewed
another woman doctor, Dr. Jean Dayton, who was serious, cautious,
and clearly freaked out that Justice was gone. Mention was then
made of the Ocean Park security guard who’d been injured, Conrad
Weiser, and Justice’s primary physician, Dr. Maurice Zellman, whose
condition was listed as stable. Conrad was still in the “serious”
category. He’d suffered a head injury that had required surgery.
Zellman had been through minor surgery as well, for the damage to
his throat and voice box, but he was responsive and
alert.
There was a brief moment with Dr. Byron
Adderley, who just managed to look pissed off; then the camera’s
eye turned to Nurse Laura Adderley, her face in profile, before Dr.
Dolph Loman’s icy blue eyes and white hair filled the screen with a
lot of hyperbole about how great Ocean Park Hospital
was.
Pauline cut him off quick, then gave a
short history of Justice Turnbull’s previous crimes, primarily
leveled against women, and without saying the word cult, brought in mention of Siren Song and even offered
a view of tall wrought-iron gates hidden in the thick old-growth
timber.
Harrison found his small notebook and
jotted down the names of the victims and the hospital personnel
listed on the television screen along with nurses Nina Perez and
Carlita Solano. He also added Detective Langdon Stone with the
TCSD, and Dr. Claire Norris from Halo Valley, Side A.
He stared down at his scribbled notes
and had a piercing moment of insight. The real story wasn’t about
Justice’s escape, or the victims at the moment of his escape. The
real story was about the past and future victims of his murderous
passion.
The cult.
That was where he should
start.
Rinsing out his coffee cup, he ran a
hand through his drying hair. God, he needed a haircut. Then he
changed from his sweats to jeans, T-shirt, and plaid overshirt, his
“look” for the teenagers, though he wasn’t planning on following
that story until later in the day. This one was a helluva lot more
interesting and just heating up.
Throwing a glance around his apartment,
he fervently wished he had a bed, a few sticks of decent furniture,
and maybe twenty thousand or so in the bank.
He headed downstairs to his Impala,
examining the bald tires with a rueful eye. He had to get these
stories written and turned in so he could be paid. Was desiring
some cold hard cash such a bad thing?
As he turned from his Seaside apartment
south, it occurred to him that he’d just encountered the sixth
deadly sin: greed.
Lang shared a squad room desk with
Detective Savannah Dunbar, who sat in a chair against the wall used
for collared perps. She was balancing a laptop on her knees and
stared at it in concentration. Lang had tried to tell her he didn’t
care if he had a desk; the reason for sharing was a matter of space
rather than budget. But Savvy just waved him off. She was a young,
attractive, serious woman who listened more than talked. She’d
risen to detective with the speed of a comet, coming from the
Gresham Police Department, a large urban city that butted up to
Portland’s east side, having made a name for herself by her deep
dedication and willingness to work the hours and then some. She’d
come to the TCSD on the heels of Lang himself, although there was
really no place for her on their roster. Lang had wondered about
Sheriff O’Halloran’s decision until one of the good old boys at the
TCSD who’d outlived their usefulness was gently eased out of the
department. Then Savvy’s hiring made sense.
Feeling his gaze on her, Savvy looked
up. Her eyes were a crystal blue, her hair a lush auburn shade,
though it was currently scraped back into a ponytail.
“It’s Saturday,” he said.
“And?”
“What are we both doing
here?”
She smiled faintly. “It’s a shame
criminals don’t have regular hours.”
Lang grinned and ran a hand around the
stubble on his unshaven jaw. He just couldn’t find the energy to
shave this morning. “Find anything on Justice?”
“Nothing we don’t already know. He grew
up around Deception Bay. His mother’s name is Madeline Turnbull.
She’s known around these parts as Mad Maddie. She made her living
managing a fleabag of a motel and as some kind of fortune-teller.”
Savvy looked up at him with serious eyes. “I don’t go in for all
that mumbo jumbo, but some people swear she was uncannily accurate
in her forecasts. Two years ago Justice nearly killed her, though
it’s uncertain whether that was by accident or design. She may have
just gotten in the way when he was targeting Rebecca Sutcliff.
Detective Sam ‘Mac’ McNally was lead on the case from the Laurelton
Police Department, and Clausen and Kirkpatrick were on it from the
TCSD.”
Lang had taken Kirkpatrick’s place when
she’d taken a different job. “Clausen was involved in the capture,”
Lang mused. “Maybe I should talk to McNally, catch his
thoughts.”
“I’ve got the Laurelton PD’s number.”
She rattled it off to him, and Lang wrote it down. “McNally’s
retired now,” she added.
“Okay.” At that moment Clausen and
Burghsmith clambered into the room, looking dead tired. They shook
their heads in unison at his lifted brows.
“Nothing,” Clausen said. “The guy’s in
the ether.” He let out a sigh. “Goddamned ghost.”
“Psychotic ghost,” Savvy
muttered.
“Maybe he went toward the valley,”
Burghsmith suggested but showed no enthusiasm for that
theory.
“Nah, he’s coming to the coast.”
Clausen gave the other deputy an annoyed look that said they’d been
over this and over it.
“So, where’s the hospital van?” Lang
said, almost a mantra for him now. “Someone would have seen
it.”
Clausen lifted a shoulder. “He either
ditched it, or he snuck through and nobody saw him.”
“Unlikely that he snuck through,” Savvy
said.
“So, then, where’d he ditch it?” Lang
asked. “And does that leave him on foot?”
“Maybe he had someone waiting for him,”
Burghsmith suggested and yanked at his suddenly tight
collar.
“He’s not that kind of guy.” Clausen
frowned as he sat down at another community desk. “He’s too
weird.”
“Even weirdos have friends.” Burghsmith
was not going to concede.
Clausen was adamant. “Not this
weirdo.”
“Okay, then, he’s on foot, or he found
some other means of transportation,” Lang said.
Savvy suggested, “Maybe he flagged down
another motorist.”
Clausen harrumphed, a sound he made
frequently. “It was all over the news about his escape. You think
anybody missed that? And just decided to give some hitchhiker a
lift?” He slammed open the top drawer and searched around for some
gum, pulling out a pack and holding it up in silent query. Everyone
shook their head to his offer.
“Somebody mighta missed it,” Lang
said.
“Well, then he could be anywhere.”
Burghsmith shrugged. “We’ve been trolling up and down the coast,
but so far nobody remembers him.”
Lang said, “If we don’t get a clue
soon, we’ll have to go to the lodge and talk to Catherine. Warn
her.”
“And what about Rebecca Sutcliff?”
Savvy asked. “She still lives in Laurelton, as far as we know. She
escaped him once, but if he’s as single-minded and on a mission as
everyone seems to think, she should be warned.”
“He’s on a mission, all right,” Clausen
said. “That’s just who the bastard is.”
“This Sutcliff woman probably saw it on
the news, too,” Lang said. “I’ll give her a call,
too.”
“In case he heads inland,” Burghsmith
said again.
Clausen sent him a dark look. “No way.
It’s the goddamned sea that’s in his blood. Like some of the
fishermen around here. He’s got a thing for it.” When Lang looked
up at him, Clausen added, “It’s in some of the original reports.
Trust me, if Turnbull’s heading anywhere, it’s closer to the ocean.
Bet a month’s salary on it.”
No one took him up on the
bet.
They discussed the extensive search
that had taken place up and down the highway to the valley and also
their traversing of Highway 101. It had been over twelve hours
since Justice’s disappearance.
“Where’s his mom now?” Lang asked
Savvy.
“Madeline Turnbull is a patient at
Seagull Pointe. It’s both assisted living and a nursing home. She’s
on Medicaid.”
“State funding,” Lang agreed. “She’s in
the nursing home, out of touch with reality,” he said, repeating
something they all knew.
Savvy nodded, her auburn hair gleaming
under the unforgiving overhead lights. “I’ll stop by and see if I
can interview her in some way.”
“Good.” Lang pushed away from the desk.
“I’ll bring O’Halloran up to date,” he said, “and then make a few
phone calls.”
“I got some more traversing of 101 to
do,” Clausen said. He didn’t even bother looking at Burghsmith, who
shrugged and said, “I’m dead on my feet, man.”
“We all need more sleep,” Lang agreed.
“Let’s meet back here at noon. With any luck, we’ll have a
lead.”